an insatiable appetite for my region by VINCENT NATTRESS

The Chicken of Tomorrow

Have you ever wondered why a rubber chicken does not look like the chicken in the grocery store? A few weeks ago Frank Reese sent me a link (which follows) to an old documentary about The Chicken of Tomorrow contest in 1948. This contest, which was funded by the A&P grocery store chain, marked a critical turning point in how we raise poultry and could fairly be seen as the beginning of the modern poultry industry. The whole of the film is worth viewing, in all its kitschy goodness, but one of the most interesting things for me was seeing what the birds of 60 years ago looked like when dressed out. Guess what? They look like rubber chickens.

Of course one of the reasons a rubber chicken looks so long and skinny compared to a dressed chicken in the grocery store is because the legs, feet, head and neck are still on the rubber chicken, which exaggerates its skinniness. Still, the plump, round body of the modern chicken is not lurking in the middle of a rubber chicken. The rubber chicken just looks scrawny. The birds in the contest, which were the best of the best being raised in 1948, are very narrow and skinny by comparison to the birds we are used to today.

You should note that in the video the folks at the A&P have created a wax model which they offer up as the ideal of what they hope will be developed as a result of this contest. It is plump, compact and broad breasted. In 1948 this wax model was only a fantasy of what a chicken could look like. Compared to a modern chicken it looks quite small, if similarly proportioned. Indeed, I bought a Ranger chicken the other day and I could not find one that was under five pounds in dressed weight. Today’s birds are just plan gargantuan by comparison. (In later posts I will talk about why this is and what the consequences are of these giants.)

The Chicken of Tomorrow marked the beginning of a change away from the American Poultry Association model, which was based on The American Standard of Perfection. As I described in a prior post, The Standard of Perfection defines and describes all of the characteristics of a specific breed. Importantly, it is based on viewing a living example of that breed. The new system, established by the Chicken of Tomorrow contest, sets a new standard based on the final product: the desired characteristics of the carcass. The new model is all about altering breeding in order to achieve the ideal broad, plump, compact dressed bird.

This contest truly ushered in a change in paradigm in which breeders were challenged to find a new way of breeding their birds in order to achieve this idealized body shape. Historically breeders had focused on single, standard breeds, and made improvements in their breed by selecting the best characteristics from within that breed. Starting here, breeders began to cross lines, or hybridise birds, in order to augment the desired characteristics. In the process we completely changed our 8000 relationship with the chicken as we began to control it breeding artificially and to greatly narrow its genetic diversity. Today, after only 60 years, we have birds that are not capable of living out-of-doors or completing a normal, natural life cycle.

Essentially, the contest was the end of what had been a sustainable poultry industry in America, with many independent, regional breeders raising their own pure-bred stock. That may sound like an overstatement, but look again at the film: all of the contestants are just regular, small, medium and large (large by 1948 standards) scale regional chicken farmers, each of whom had their own breeding stock. Each of these independent breeders was able to compete on a national stage for the title of the best chicken in America. That is over. That cannot happen today, because all commercial breeding stock in the world is controlled by about three companies. There are essentially no independent producers left, except for a handful of tiny growers who sell to farmers markets or direct to consumers, and 99% of them get their breeding stock from the same three companies anyway. Poultry genetics has been eviscerated and with it growers ability to exist outside of the industrial system.

The question a lot of you are asking right not is “So what? If they raise a better chicken, isn’t that progress?” The answer is, maybe yes, but probably no.

What if the new genetic lines developed to produce this new, improved chicken are not as healthy, fertile, strong or generally sustainable as Standard Breeds? What if the new birds have higher mortality rates and are susceptible to a whole range of new and unprecedented diseases? What if, in order to achieve this new bird, we had to cross and recross birds to the point that the birds are really inbred? What if the genetics of the new breeds become proprietary and are owned by only a few companies who would then control the industry? What if the old breeds disappeared, replaced by the new birds, and as a result there is a lot lest genetic diversity in our food system? What if these new birds were highly dependent on drugs to keep them alive long enough to get them to slaughter weight? What if as a result of this chain of events the poultry industry were to consolidate so dramatically that most poultry farmers were driven out of business and most of the rest of the chickens we eat were eventually being produced in China and Brazil? And what if as a result of all of this very, very cheap chicken we as a nation were eating four times more of it per capita than Americans 60 years ago, and were seeing all the associated health consequences of the KFC “Double Down” and the McNugget? If these things were true, would it still be a good idea?

In a later post I will actually get some chickens Frank Reese has raised and cook them to let you all know if the true pure-bred chickens live up to my hopes for them. I will also talk about how to cook the Chicken of Yesterday, because, as I mentioned in earlier posts, these older, more mature birds need to be cooked differently than we have become accustomed to of late. I for one am looking forward to trying Frank’s birds.

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4 Responses

Teacher, teacher! I know, I know! (raises hand frantically!)….
I was just talking to somebody TODAY about this! In relationship to turkeys, but the same thing. The heirloom turkey carcasses look incredibly different than the hybrid “broad-breasted” types which look, well, suspiciously like they spent some time under the knife pre-Thanksgiving in hopes of a turkey porn star career. Unfortunately for them the “broad breasted” has precluded the rest of the story when it comes to turkey procreation, so it’s all just a sad turkey tease, really.
It really is amazing to look at the carcasses side by and side. I butchered a few of my roosters last year and yep, they looked rather like the rubber chicken above. EVEN THOUGH they are a dual-purpose meat/egg breed and the carcasses dressed at a respectable 3 to 4 lbs. But…they are a heirloom breed and they just don’t get that crazy pumped up chicken boob thing. It’s just plain weird.
Can’t wait to hear what you thought of Frank’s bird!

Georgie,
I just ordered four birds for Friday delivery. I know that Frank has “improved” his lines significantly to get better meat birds, while still maintaining the appearance of the birds and their ability to do things like walk, breed, and live long enough to reproduce. What a crazy idea. I will take photos (not like the photos YOU alluded to) of the birds so you can see if they shape up.
Vincent

Cool. I’m getting more Buckeye chicks any day now (I was hoping to hatch my own, but the unfortunate demise of both my roosters nixayed that idea…). I expect I’ll have a half a dozen or so roosters to slaughter later this summer. You’ll have to check them out to see how they compare to the birds you get from Frank.

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Welcome

This blog is an exploration of my region's food, season by season. I will focus on foraging, farming and how to cook what I find. I will also discuss food politics and the history of what we eat and why.

Foraging often reveals traditions that make this region unique. I will do my best to remind us of some of these vanishing traditions, because they reveal a lot about our cultural history.

Agriculture shapes the landscape we live in. Right now farming is undergoing a critical transition. More than ever we all need to understand the importance of diverse, regional food production, for what it means to our region, our bucolic surroundings, the safety and stability of our food system and our own personal health.

Exploring these food issues reveals a lot about our environmental and economic issues too. I will ask questions about the ways in which we are changing our food systems and how, as a result, our food is changing us.

This is a bountiful area, but also a changing area, and population growth, environmental degradation and vanishing food traditions threaten to change the way we feed ourselves forever.

Food is a lens through which to view where we are and how we got here. Because of this we can begin to ask the question about what to do next, so that we can live our lives more deliciously while leaving something behind that is worthy of the next generation.